On Assignment for WHO - Directing 4 Videos About their Social Prescribing Campaign

I was commissioned by the WHO Western Pacific Regional Office to direct 4 videos about their Social Prescribing for Healthy Aging programme in Cambodia to form part of their training toolkit. The toolkit provides implementing partners with an overview of the best practices of how implement social prescribing at the community level.

The Social Prescribing for Healthy Aging programme is a way for healthcare workers to connect people to a range of non-clinical services in the community and to help the elderly not feel anxiety, loneliness or depression.

The toolkit is designed for policy makers and community health centres to help them run effective social prescribing schemes.

The brief was to make 4 videos to highlight the key aspects of successfully implementing social prescribing schemes.

The first video features Dr Kao Sovandara, a lecturer at The Royal University of Phnom Penh and part of the lead team implementing social prescribing in Cambodia. He gives an overview of the programme, the training they provide and how that works at a grassroots level.

The second video features Yem Sameoun, who is a commune councillor responsible for running the scheme in her community. She talks about the training she receives, the work she does in the community and the positive outcomes.

The third video features Nget Krin, an elderly community member. She talks about the situation she faces, the support she receives and how that makes her feel.

The fourth video features Dr Khan Sareth, a lecturer at The Royal University of Phnom Penh and part of the lead team implementing social prescribing in Cambodia. He gives an overview of what they’ve achieved and reflects on how the scheme can be improved in the future.

While the project is intrinsically nebulous in nature, I hope it can have an impact in Cambodia, regionally and in the rest of the world. As the world’s population is aging, it’s increasingly important to make sure everyone feels included within their communities.

You can see other example of my work for WHO here and here.

On Location - Filming a Corporate Video for Endo Lighting

It was great to team up with Khreativa Cambodia to work on a corporate video for Endo Lighting to showcase their lighting installations at the newly opened AEON 3 Mall in Phnom Penh.

Endo Lighting commissioned Khreativa Cambodia to provide a series of photos and a video and I was fortunate to be given the lead on the video production.  

After a pre-production meeting and looking at the sample videos provided by the client, we decided on the techniques and equipment that we would use to capture the feeling of entering the mall and experiencing the different moods created by the coloured lighting throughout the day.

For the exteriors, I used my DJI Mavic 2 Pro due to its low-light capabilities, as some of the shots were taken at dusk, and stability in wind.

The client also wanted interior drone shots to show the Skywalk and to fly up the central atrium to show the different lighting atmospheres they created on different levels.

As the Mavic 2 has height restrictions when it can’t use enough GPS satellites, we had to hire a Mini 3 Pro to be able to capture the interior drone shots.

For the ground shots, I used a gimbal at eye level and a gimbal mounted on a boom to capture higher shots for a different perspective. A wireless transmitter was mounted to the set up so that we could monitor the feed and an assistant could remotely control tilts to add dynamism.

Endo Lighting were very happy with the video and even entered it into a corporate video competition!

Below is the finished video:

You can see other examples of my corporate videos here and here.

Drone photography and videography for Steff Gruber | Aerial Visuals in Phnom Penh

Steff got in touch with me to provide drone photography and videography services for a long-term photographic project he’s working on about the community that live on the railway tracks behind the station in Phnom Penh.

He was trying to get permission to film from one of the trains to give the perspective from a train passing through the community. This proved too complicated and he came up with the idea to photograph and take videos of the area with a drone to complete the project before he flew back Switzerland the following day.

Steff has been visiting the area for several years doing a study on the area that is right in the centre of Phnom Penh but remains massively underdeveloped. While slightly daunting for Steff and I and the team, locals barely battered an eye-lid as trains passed centimeters from them.

Steff plans to host an exhibition of his photos and my drone shots in the coming months. He aslo got me to shoot some drone videography to be used on the website for the exhibition and who knows, maybe a couple of the clips may feature in the exhibition itself.

It was great to work alongside Steff and listen to advice from an accomplished filmmaker and photograper. It also good to see someone working on a long-term project that has spanned several years in a world that is increasingly becoming more instantaneous and disposable.

You can see more of my drone photography work here and other examples of my drone videography work here.

I look forward to sharing more information about the exhibition he’s planning. Below are some of the drone photos I took:

On Location as a Camera Assistant and Drone Pilot for CNN in Cambodia

Work as a camera assistant and drone pilot on the Cambodia episode of CNN’s Nomad with Carlton McCoy for the second series.

It’s not often that you get a call from CNN at 2pm and by 4pm you’re onset, working for one of the most established production companies in the game. Zero Point Zero are the company behind Anthony Bourdain’s shows. If you haven’t seen the closing gambit from the Cambodia episode of a cook’s tour, it’s a testament to Bourdain’s writing and humanity.

The camera assistant / drone pilot who had travelled with the team from the US tested positive for Covid on arrival, so they needed someone to step in at short notice. Shortly after receiving the call, I was in the back of the van going over the kit with camera team.

On the evening of the first day, the DP tested positive, so we travelled to Siem Reap as a camera team of 2 before flying back to Phnom Penh less than 24 hours later.

When we got back to Phnom Penh the camera operator tested positive for Covid. Fortunately, CNN had flown in a DP from Thailand. We were the camera department for the next couple of days before the original camera assistant and drone pilot thankfully returned to the fray for the last couple of days.

It was an incredible learning experience to work with such an experienced team and a great crash course in lots of camera and lighting kit (and techniques) that I hadn’t used before.

Once again thanks to Nick at Hanuman Films for the recommendation. I look forward to sharing the show once the episodes airs. Below are a couple of drone photos I managed to snap along the way. You can see more examples of my drone videography here. Please get in touch about any video projects you have in Cambodia, SE Asia or the rest of the world.

Lighting camera operator for BECL Corporate Video

It was great working as a lighting camera operator and drone pilot with Christina and the teams from Cast Laboratories Singapore and Cast Laboratories Cambodia to produce this corporate video for Board of Engineers Cambodia Laboratory (BECL).

The video highlights the work that BECL do to emphasize the importance of testing and ensure safety standards in both existing and new structures in the burgeoning Cambodian construction market. This is an increasingly important job as the construction boom in Phnom Penh and many areas of Cambodia shows little sign of slowing down.

The corporate video demonstrates the tests Cast Laboratories do in Cambodia, including compression strength testing of concrete, testing steel and concrete in a non-destructive way, rebar tensile testing and many more of the services they provide.

My work as a lighting camera operator included working with two, Apurture C300D ii lights and 2 LED panels to give the video clean, even lighting to highlight the technical processes. Overall the client was very happy with the quality of the images I shot. The variety I provided them with allowed them to create split-screen segments in post-production to add dynamism to the final video. You can see another corporate video I shot here and more examples of my camera work here.

A corporate video about testing construction materials for BECL.

Here are some behind the scenes (BTS) photos of me in action: